


Training Days

by CryptidOwl007



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: 1st chapter takes place after episode 2, BTW, Fluff, Gen, Keith doesn't know it yet, Klance is love Klance is life, M/M, Meme King Lance, Uncultured Swine Keith, but when he realizes his own gayness it's gonna be GREAT
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-21
Updated: 2016-08-21
Packaged: 2018-08-10 06:16:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7833529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CryptidOwl007/pseuds/CryptidOwl007
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Forming Voltron and fighting the Galra Empire requires years of training. Unfortunately for these paladins, they don't have that kind of time. They must put their maximum effort and concentration into every battle to survive. But for Keith and Lance, they have an even harder task- get along.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Training Days

The barrage of incoming bullets could be handled one of two ways:

_ I can knock them aside and we can head in for an attack,  _ Keith proposed. Lance countered him almost immediately, aggressively butting in.

_ That would take to long,  _ Lance objected.  _ Better to dodge and then attack.  _

Through Voltron’s mental connection, everyone could feel both of their tempers rise. A collective sigh and  _ “not this again”  _ swept through the rest of them. Lance and Keith stopped arguing as the others frustration washed over them, but neither could completely suppress their anger.   

_ Enough, we need to decide!  _ Shiro ordered. Focusing back at the incoming bullets that had come shockingly close while they bickered, everyone consented to a plan.

Keith swung his sword to cut through the blasts and Hunk planted into the ground to give him support for the swing. At the same time, Lance and Pidge flared up their engines to maneuver Voltron out of the way. The resulting chaos from the two separate plans being put into action was enough to make Keith miss and make them slow enough to take a direct hit. The impact sent the already unbalanced Voltron spinning into the sky.

“KEITH!” Lance yelled.

“LANCE!” Keith yelled back.    

Before the five of them could stabilize their connection, Voltron had disassembled violently, the five lions tumbling away from each other. Abruptly the fire stopped and Allura linked into their comms, her face appearing on their screens. 

“What happened? Why did Voltron disappear?” Allura’s concerned voice fell on deaf ears. Losing the mental connection with each other like that was disorientating- they were all left hollow and scrambling to collect their thoughts. Looking at the five paladins on her screen, Allura could see the loss and confusion caused by the sudden disassembly on their faces. Lance and Keith recovered first, immediately rounded on each other, even angrier than before.

Allura wondered how much of that anger was because of the lost connection. 

“What were you doing?! We had all agreed on MY plan,” Keith’s anger was reflected not just in his voice, but in his lion as well. Red’s tail whipped back and forth, ready to leap onto Blue given the chance.

Blue was similarly posed, with Lance similarly angry. 

“What are you talking about, everyone Clearly agreed with my plan. Yours was stupid aft-”

Allura cut in before he could finish, “No! You all individually agreed to the plan you thought was best. Instead of making a team decision, you all did whatever you wanted! That is Not how Voltron works.” Harshly, she continued to push them, “You must become one mind to make one decision collectively. Like this, you’ll just be torn apart again and again.”

Red and Blue stood down, turning away from each other, as the reality of her words sunk in. It had taken them four tries to even form Voltron, and if they disassembled this easily…

“Zarkon will exploit any weakness to get Voltron. I know you’ve only just learned how to assemble, but you have to master it.” Allura frowned as silence filled the comms. She could tell each of them wanted to work together, but being thrown together like they had made an already hard task nearly impossible.       

“We’ll stop here for today,” Allura sighed, “Come back, and we’ll start something new.” 

Keith grit his teeth. Heading in this early didn’t sit right with him- they should be training more if anything! Following the rest of his silent team back into the castle, he prepared himself for whatever Allura had in store for them next. 

_ Which will probably be harder than trying to form Voltron,  _ he thought. Keith was surprised to feel agreement from Red, along with a faint memory of grueling training led by Allura. A blurry and indistinct person in Red’s cockpit was arguing with her, but Keith could tell it was just friendly banter. Underlying Red’s memory was a faint sense of loss and regret. 

_ Was that your former paladin?  _ Keith probed. A brisk confirmation from Red was all he got as she pulled the memory away from him.  Landing in the hangar, he decided not to press for details. As Keith left his lion to rejoin the others, he couldn’t help but wonder, even though Red had accepted him as a pilot, if Red had really accepted him as her paladin.  

* * *

Allura and Coran were waiting for them in the break room. Lance immediately flopped onto the couch upon arrival, with Pidge right behind him. Both looked irritated enough to kill, but Hunk seemed as relaxed as ever eating one of the supplement bars he had created. No one knew where he kept them all, but it seemed he could produce an infinite amount of them from thin air.

Keith sat opposite while Shiro took his now customary place standing next to Allura, who seemed to be debating with herself. Removing her hand from her chin, something she tended to do when thinking, everyone looked expectantly at her. 

“It’s dangerous to continue forming Voltron as you have been. So for a while, we’ll discontinue that part of your training.” Her voice was firm, and it was clear her decision had been made. Lance hadn’t even finished processing what she’d said before he started objecting.

“Dangero- What does that even mean? How can forming Voltron be Dangerous?” Sitting up to gesture emphatically at everyone else, he continued.

“Isn’t that the only reason we’re here, to form Voltron and beat up bad guys?” 

Keith sighed and stood up to face Allura, “He’s right for once,” crossing his arms, he ignored Lance who was now fuming. “We have to keep trying or else we’ll never be able to win. We have to figure out how to fight as Voltron,” he said, directing the last part straight at Lance. 

Lance snapped.

“Are you saying it’s my fault we can’t form Voltron?” Launching himself up from the couch, he got in Keith’s face. “As I recall you weren’t exactly being a team player either!” 

“At least I’m not endangering the rest of the team with my reckless piloting!” Keith shot back, rising to Lance’s challenge. Shiro opened his mouth to intervene, but Allura beat him to it.

“Enough,” she cut in, “you’re both on the same side!”

“Literally,” Pidge interjected, gesturing at a Voltron hologram she had pulled up. “You two make up the right side. If you can’t work together, half of Voltron is useless.”

Keith grimaced as he looked at the diagram. Of course they had to work together to fight as Voltron, but something about Lance just… put him on  _ edge.  _ Lance seemed to simply not like him however, as he loudly exclaimed,

“Work together with  _ him?  _ Keith’s impossible to work with! Not even Gandhi could handle this guy’s attitude,” Lance and Keith entered into a death glare contest while Allura looked to the other paladins for answers.

“Gan...dhi?” she asked, rolling the unfamiliar word over her tongue. Pidge adjusted her glasses as she answered.

“A man renowned for his patience. It’s said he was patient enough to sew a thousand spider legs togeth-”

“Pidge.” Shiro interrupted, giving her a stern look before she could finish the absurd lie. Busying herself with the Voltron hologram in an attempt to hide a smirk, Pidge seemed undisturbed by Shiro’s warning tone. Allura was still confused as to what- or who- a ‘Gandhi’ was, but filed it away as something to figure out later.

“Look,” she snapped, temporarily regaining Lance and Keith’s attention, “disassembling from Voltron like you have been puts a strain on your already weak bond. So until you can all get along well enough to be in the same room as each other,” she told them, directing a hard stare towards the two of them again, ”you won’t be forming Voltron.”

Coran quickly jutted in before anyone could take a breath and argue with her,

“The princess is right! As such, you’ll all spend the day helping us get the castle back up and running.” Coran winked while stroking his mustache as everyone groaned. Cleaning the castle was a daunting task, and one no one wanted to do. 

“There’s nothing quite like cleaning to get those bonds of friendship forming after all!” Coran continued, “Shiro, Pidge, and Hunk, you’ll be working on getting our engine’s back online with Allura. As for you two,” he said pointing to Lance and Keith, “you’ll be helping me scrub this place back to it’s former glory.”

“What!” Lance exclaimed, “Why do I have to be with the old guy and Mullet? And scrubbing floors to top it off!” Keith ignored him, choosing instead to stare pointedly at the wall, which only made Lance angrier.

“See?! Impossible to work with!” Coran batted Lance’s accusatory hand away from Keith.

“That’ll be enough,” he told him. “If this can’t get you two working together, then nothing can.”

Keith took a moment to mentally prepare himself for the ordeal ahead before walking past Lance towards the doors. 

“Let’s just get this over with, okay?” he shot at Lance.

“That’s the spirit,” Coran yelled, following with a grumbling Lance in tow.

 

“Now, the key to this,” Coran told them, tossing each a sponge, “is to really put your back into it. 10,000 years worth of grime won’t come off easily.” Laughing he picked up his own sponge. “I’ll leave the training room to you two while I tend to the healing pods.” In a slightly more somber voice, he added, “I’ve a feeling we’re going to be needing them very soon.” Keith and Lance stared at him in disbelief.

Brightening up almost immediately again, Coran waltz out, leaving them with only the echos of a farewell. Both boys could only stare at the now closed doors of the training room, dumbfounded as always by Corans enthusiasm, especially after that cryptic comment. 

Keith sighed and looked around the training room. It hadn’t looked dirty when they had used it yesterday, but now that he wasn’t distracted by flying drones or the gladiator…

“It’s filthy,” Lance said with disgust, “I can’t believe we were rolling all over this floor yesterday.” He began rolling up the sleeves on his jacket, but stopped as he looked around the room again. Grimase increasing, he began to strip.

“Uh, what are you doing?” Keith asked Lance, raising an eyebrow. Lance raised his own eyebrow in response, one arm already out of his jacket.

“Well, it’s not like I’m gonna clean with my jacket ON, you heathen. This is the only one I’ve got too.” Glowering at him, Keith contemplated taking his own off. Deciding it wasn’t worth the trouble, he began scrubbing at the walls of the room, ignoring the now flexing Lance. 

“Suns out, guns out,” he smirked. When Keith didn’t rise to his challenge, Lance pouted and started scrubbing a section of the floor on the opposite side. Neither said a word. 

As the work dragged on with seemingly no end, Keith snuck a peek at how Lance was doing. He was shocked to see how much he had cleaned, and how well he had done it. Compared to Keith’s area, it was practically sparkling. Scrutinizing Lance, he tried to figure out how he was doing it.

Lance’s biceps were well defined to Keith’s amazement, plus he didn’t seem to grow tired despite the amount of scrubbing he was doing. Glowering again, Keith went back to scrubbing even harder than before. 

A flicker of motion, just out of sight, set Keith on alert. Scanning the room, his eyes settled on the control room for the training center. Through the window, he could see a faint outline, but of what, he couldn’t tell. Straining his eyes, he took a step closer.         

“Hey, are you slacking off?” Lance’s voice broke Keith’s concentration as he whirled back around to face him. “You better not expect me to clean this whole place by myself, Mullet.”

“I’m not slacking off,” he retorted, “and stop calling me that. I have a name, use it.” Glancing back up to the clearly empty control room, he added, “I just thought I saw someone up there.”

“Alright  _ Keith _ ,” Lance said, adding emphasis to his name, “Where?” Following Keith’s line of sight, he asked, “The control room? I don’t see anyone.” Keith barely registered what Lance was saying, just a little bit hung up on how he’d said his name.

“C’mon,” Lance said, going back to his sponge, “You probably just imagined it. And we still have a lot to clean.”

“Yeah,” Keith agreed, slowly picking up his sponge again. Silence filled the air between them, with an occasional clunk and hiss from the ship. Every strange noise put Keith more and more on edge. Sneaking another peek at Lance, who looked perfectly relaxed, he decided he was just being paranoid.

_ Wshhh _

Lance jumped nearly a foot in the air, his relaxed facade disappearing at the soft noise that emanated from inside the room. Back on high alert, Keith stared as one of the portals in the floor opened and a figure rose out of it. Right on queue, Lance began yelling and pointing.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold up. Isn’t that the gladiator from yesterday? What’s it doing out?!”

“No idea,” Keith said slowly, shifting his feet to get a better stance. He still remembered the beating it had given all five of them yesterday. With just the two of them there, Keith hoped it wouldn’t turn on.

Cautiously going up to the gladiator, Lance scrutinized it. With no sign of life, he poked at it with his sponge, asking, “Are we supposed to clean this?”

At his touch, the light in the gladiators eyes turned on, and a robotic voice filled the training room.

“ _ Training Level 4 Initiated.”  _

For once, Lance was silent. Quickly recovering, he laughed and poked it again before looking over to Keith.

“Ahaha, did this just say level four? Even though we couldn’t beat level one with five people yesterday?” Keith lunged forward as he talked, grabbing the back of Lance’s shirt, to yank him unceremoniously away from the gladiator’s now swinging staff.

A strangled yell escaped Lance as Keith threw him across the floor. Throwing up his arm and summoning his shield, Keith remembered too late that he wasn’t wearing his suit anymore. 

The staff cracked into him, sending him flying. Another yell came from Lance as he caught and cushioned Keith’s fall. Rolling off Lance, he clenched his hand. Luckily it didn’t seem to be broken- heavily bruised probably, but useable. Reaching into his jacket, Keith pulled out his bayard.  

“Where’s your bayard?” he yelled at Lance.

“In my jacket!” Lance yelled back, pointed across the room. Gritting his teeth, Keith summoned his sword. Placing himself between the gladiator and Lance, he barked an order.

“I’ll cover you, so hurry up and go get it!” Charging at the gladiator, Keith exchanged blows with it, trying to keep its attention on him and him alone. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Lance creeping around behind, trying to get to his jacket unnoticed.   

But Keith couldn’t keep an eye on Lance and keep up with the gladiator; he had to devote his whole concentration on the machine in front of him.

The gladiator rained blow after blow on Keith, and his bruised arm quickly started to grow weak. Sweating, he stumbled back, trying to distance himself from the onslaught.

_ Patience yields focus,  _ Keith gasped over and over, attempting to regain his composure and look for an opening. Taking another step back, his foot slipped.

_ The sponge!  _ Thrown off balance, there was no way to avoid the next hit. Bracing himself, Keith watched as the staff swung towards him.

A voice from behind the gladiator filled him with relief.

_ “ _ Oh no you don’t!” Firing three shots, Lance hit the gladiator’s shoulder, elbow, and wrist joints with pinpoint accuracy. Halting its attack, the gladiator quickly switched targets. Lance continued to fire at the joints, hoping to stop its movement. The gladiator barely slowed down, reaching him in a few short leaps. Panic filled Keith as he saw the staff swinging towards Lance's head.

“Lance!” he cried out, desperately trying to reach him, to get in the way, to stop the blow, to do something to protect Lance. But Lance seemed perfectly confident in his dodging abilities, confident enough to crack a joke.

“What, that all you got? Even Hunk’s faster than this!” he crowed, rolling out of reach. 

Or what he thought was out of reach anyway.

The gladiator’s staff barely grazed him, but the electrified ends ensured he got a nasty shock. Grunting, Lance clung to his bayard, intent on keeping it in his grasp. Finally reaching them, Keith again planted himself between Lance and the gladiator.

“I’m your opponent,” he growled, adding, “Lance stay out of the way!”

A shot whizzed past his ear, barely grazing it, to hit the gladiators eye dead on. Whirling around while clutching at his ear, Keith stared dumbfounded at Lance. Through gritted teeth he hissed,

“Don’t tell me to stay out of the way.” Switching his fiery stare from Keith to something behind him, Lance began firing again. Shaking Lance’s face from his memory, he stumbled out of the way of his bullets, which were coming perilously close to Keith.    

“Watch it,” he shot back at Lance. Lance just grinned and continued lay down cover fire.

“Stay out of the way then!” With the gladiator focused on deflecting Lance’s bullets, Keith quickly moved in from the side. Jumping to gain power, he swung down into the gladiators elbow joint. With a satisfying swish, his bayard cut cleanly through. The clatter from the arm and staff falling resounded in the training room. Skipping backwards, Lance unloaded. 

It seemed to be over in an instant, the machine dissipating like it was never there. All of Lance’s bullets had been able to hit critical points once the gladiator didn’t have a staff to deflect them with.    

“ _ Training Level 4 Completed.”  _

Lance and Keith stared at each other for a moment before Keith collapsed onto his back, laughing. They had beat Level four! Together! Gasping for breath between laughs, he looked over at Lance, who was sitting down trying to catch his own breath. Staring at Keith, Lance opened and closed his mouth, trying to figure out what to say.

Keith sat up, his laugh dying out. Had he done something wrong? Why wasn’t Lance saying anything? Nervous, Keith asked him what was wrong.

“I’ve never heard you laugh before. Like ever! Not even when you were still at the garrison!” Smirking he gave him a thumbs up, “You should do it more often.”

Keith scrambled up and turned away, ”Shut up Lance,” he told him. Covering his now warm cheeks with his hands, Keith couldn’t face Lance, even as he continued to talk to him.

“What! I was giving you a compliment!” He continued to grumble as Keith rushed towards the exit. “Where are you going?” Lance called out to him. Recovered from his earlier embarrassment, Keith looked over his shoulder.      

“I’m not staying in here. It turned on once, it might do it again.” He saw fear flash across Lance faces and he scrambled towards Keith.

“Then don’t leave me in here alone!” he practically wailed. Keith felt a slight blush return as Lance clung to his shoulder. Shaking him off, he hissed, “Don’t cling to me.”

“Well excuuusee me,” Lance replied, throwing his hands up in surrender. Walking behind, Keith he kept looking over his shoulder even after they’d left the training room.  _ Can’t blame him,  _ Keith thought. Resisting the urge to check himself, he forged ahead to the engine room.

“We’ll have to tell Allura and Coran. Probably a ship malfunction.”  _ Hopefully one anyway,  _ Keith added silently. Lance muttered an agreement, still looking behind them. A mischievous presence brushed against his consciousness, suggesting an idea.

“ _ Scare him.” _

_ Red!  _

Keith considered it, glancing back at Lance. He grinned. Red supplied an image of a corner just ahead of them that he would make him disappear out of sight. Just before they turned the corner, Keith paused and looked around nervously. Lance immediately went on high alert.

“What is it,” he whispered. Keith gave one last look around before moving forward.

“Nothing, just hearing things.” he said slowly. Rounding the corner, he quickly ducked into the crevice Red had shown him. Barely making it out of sight, Lance rounded the corner, only to be greeted by an empty hallway. He froze, calling out tentatively down the long hallway.

“Keith? Buddy, you there?” He shuffled forward a few steps, just past Keith. Sweat was practically dripping down his face, as he called out again, “Very funny Keith! Glad to see you finally got a sense of humor!” A clang from somewhere deep within the castle made him leap a foot in the air and turn his back too Keith. “This isn’t funny anymore!” Lance yelled at the air. 

“ _ Now!”  _ Red urged, gleeful. Leaping forward, Keith grabbed Lance from behind and shouted in his ear.

“Boo!”

Lance screamed. Sagging into Keith’s arms, he looked ready to faint. Keith could barely support his weight as he cracked up, his sides burning from laughing that hard. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d laughed this hard as he clutched Lance tighter trying to stay on his feet.

Pressed up against him, Lance was still breathing heavily. Grinning down at him, Keith told him,

“You should have seen your face!” Wonder was sketched across Lance's face as he gazed back up at Keith. Trying to hide it, he forced a scowl.

“That was a dick move Keith! A good prank,” he conceded, “but a dick move!” Keith continued to laugh as he helped steady Lance. Finally letting go, he stepped back to gloat.

“I can’t believe you fell for that,” Keith joked, a smirk creeping up his face. Lance grumbled.

“How did you even know about that,” he asked, incredulously pointing at the crevice Keith had disappeared into. Keith could feel Red roaring with laughter in the back of his mind.

“Red showed it to me,” he explained. Lance looked stunned, the prank forgotten.

“You can hear Red all the way across the castle?” Keith nodded, and Lance’s jaw dropped. “I can barely feel Blue at this distance, but you two can plan  _ pranks?”  _ Placing his hands in the prayer position, he took a deep breath. Exhaling, he told Keith, “ _ BOI.” _

Keith raised an eyebrow. Lance looked crushed. “Nevermind,” he said, turning away, “Let’s just go find everyone else.” 

Following, Keith wondered what “boi” even meant.

* * *

“How was cleaning the training room paladins?” Allura asked as they entered the engine room. “Have you started working together yet?”  

Both boys shared a glance while everyone else stared them down. Shiro, Allura, and Hunk all seemed pleased, bu Pidge barely looked up from the console to look at them.

“I guess?” Keith ventured. Lace shrugged, and everyone laughed under their breath at how oblivious the pair was. They had seemed to get along better as they made their way to there, Keith thought. Coran popped up from underneath a control panel, where neither had known he was. 

“Like I always said, there’s nothing quite like fighting together to get those bonds forming!” Lance grinned at Keith, but he knit his eyebrows. Turning to Coran, he tried to put a finger on what was bugging him.   


“Wait… we never said we were fighting.” Coran froze, and a small bead of sweat dripped down his brow. Lance gasped.

“It was you! You set the gladiator on us! We nearly Died!” Lance had been forced to clean, been attacked, and had a prank pulled on him by Keith, all in one day. He’d had enough. 

“Oh, quiznak,” Coran muttered, attempting to escape Lance and the room.

“Oh no you don’t,” Keith yelled, vaulting the panel. “Let’s go Lance!” Chasing after him, they didn’t realize they both were grinning. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> THIS IS FOR MY AMAZING FRIEND THE-FORGOTTEN-FANGIRL ON TUMBLR! Sorry it took so long but I hope you like it!!! There's going to be more chapters, but don't hold your breath cause I just started college lmao. As always constructive criticism is welcomed and appreciated.


End file.
